


The Talk

by LarissaFae



Category: Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Awkward Conversations, Gen, The Author Regrets Nothing, The Talk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-09-29 11:49:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20435540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LarissaFae/pseuds/LarissaFae
Summary: Even outcasts need The Talk.





	The Talk

**Author's Note:**

  * For [xenontrioxide](https://archiveofourown.org/users/xenontrioxide/gifts).

> xenon paid me real american dollars to write this and i have never not regretted anything so much

“Rost, what are those boars doing?”

He paused, slid his gaze to the side, then took a moment to answer.

“... Mating.”

“What’s that?”

“... How young are produced.”

“What are young?”

“... Children.”

The six-year old considered this, then giggled. “They’re funny.”

“Yes,” he agreed, turning back to the Watcher in his sights and breathing a soft sigh of relief that she wasn’t inclined to ask for more details, “they are.”

***

Short, sharp little gasps woke him up. His hand twitched toward his bow before the pitch and rhythm registered, then his eyes went wide and he rolled onto his stomach as quietly and naturally as possible, pulling the thick furs around him up to cover his ears.

She was twelve. Of course she would have discovered her body by now. Of course she would be figuring out what felt good and then doing it, because it felt good.

It didn’t mean that he was prepared for it. Or wanted to hear it.

The next evening he stood as she was washing their dishes in the bucket kept for that purpose, reaching for his bow. She looked up, hazel eyes wide with surprise.

“I will be back in an hour or two,” he told her. “You will be fine here on your own.”

“Where are you going?” she asked, eagerly reaching for her own bow.

“Hunting. _Alone.”_

“But ---”

_“Stay.”_

He turned and left her muttering to herself - try as he might, he hadn’t been able to break her of her sarcastic streak - walking to the gate before stopping to let his eyes adjust to the dark. He didn’t particularly _want_ to be hunting at night, but machines would be more visible and therefore less dangerous, and he would take night hunting over hearing her pleasuring herself any day. Or night, as it were.

True to his word, two hours later he slammed four boar carcasses, five rabbits, and three turkeys into the snowbank to the left of the steps to their home. They wouldn’t have to hunt for a couple of weeks, and he pursed his lips in irritation. Now he would have to think of another excuse to leave her for an hour or so each night. He could always have her haul some of it to Grata.

“Aloy,” he called.

“Coming!” was her almost immediate reply. He figured she already had, if the chipper look on her face when she flung the door open was any indication. Then he kicked himself for thinking that. Her eyes went wide as she looked at the animals. “Whoa! That’s a lot!”

“Cover it,” he told her as he walked up the steps. He paused and looked down at her bare feet with pursed lips, and she turned them inward and gave him a cheeky grin. He let out a short sigh. “You will clean them all tomorrow, then take some to Grata.”

_“Ugh,_ she’s so _weird,”_ the girl grumbled as she leaned over to try to cover the carcasses without getting in the snow. Then she shrieked when he toed her in the rear and sent her face-first into the snowbank. _“Rost!”_ she screamed as she popped out of it, glaring and throwing fistfulls of snow at him as he snorted with laughter. _“Augh! I’m going to freeze!”_

“Then hurry,” was all he told her as he ducked a snowball and backed inside, closing the door behind him.

***

“Rost!” He looked up slowly as she slammed the door open and ran to him, almost falling over as she grabbed his arm and started shoving him toward the gate, pushing his bow and quiver at him. “We need food! You have to go hunting!”

He blinked before looking at the small pile of geese he was cleaning.

Aloy huffed. “No! Trust me. I promise. I want boar tonight! _Please?”_ she wheedled, beaming and hugging his arm and batting her eyelashes at him.

He sighed and nodded, washing his hands off before getting up as she squeaked with excitement. She had realized, at some point over the past two years, that being left home alone meant ample time to … educate herself. Whether she knew that that was his intended purpose or not, he couldn’t say, but she had gotten the point regardless. He rarely protested when she wanted him to go for a while. All young children eventually needed that sort of time to themselves, after all.

He supposed that he would have to bring up the women’s tea at some point, as well as sex itself. But she was only fourteen, he rationalized as he ruffled her hair and got a scowl in return, and an outcast as well. He didn’t have to worry about her starting _that_ part of life just yet.

His chest constricted as he pushed aside the thought that he would have to worry about it at all, once she was a brave and a part of the tribe again.

***

A group of children around her age were swimming after having taken down the group of Scrappers by the small pond, stripped to the barest of linen across their privates, laughing and shoving at each other as they cooled off in the summer heat. They had tracked the group as they hunted, watching their various techniques, and quietly discussing what they could have done better. Now Rost started inching back from the ledge, lesson complete, but paused when Aloy didn’t move.

“Come.”

She was still staring at the group, eyes a little wide, biting her lower lip gently. Rose followed her gaze, then looked back at her again as his gut twisted. She was no longer interested in their hunting technique - she was looking at their bodies, her face flushed, her breathing a little uneven as one of the girls pulled pulled the linen trousers of a boy down, and catching when his friend retaliated by pulling her shirt off. There were protests from the others, cries for the two to either go off alone or put their clothing back on and stop messing around, then Rost touched her arm and she jumped, turning her head sharply to him with a guilty look.

“Come,” he repeated, as if he hadn’t already told her, hadn’t noticed her distraction, hadn’t noticed _why_ she was distracted.

“Uh, yeah,” she whispered breathily, stealing one last look at the group before inching back with him. They were almost home when she spoke again. “Uhm … do we need anything?” He kept his gaze straight ahead. He didn’t want to have the coming talk. “I mean, machine parts, food …?”

“Are you volunteering to go?”

“Uh …” She was trying to figure out if it was safe to do what she wanted to do out in the wild, and Rost finally relented.

“What do you need? I can go get it while you clean the weapons. _All_ of them.”

She made a face, but decided that that was better than not getting any time to herself at all. “Ah, we could use some fish. And, uh, we’re kind of low on healing potions.”

He nodded as they walked up the path to their small house. It took him a few tries to speak past the nervous knot in his chest, but she took it as his usual stoicness.

“Very well. Get more arrows. After I get back, there is something we must discuss.”

She frowned at him, but he wouldn’t answer her when she asked what it was he wanted to talk about.

***

“All-Mother, blessed are You and the bounty You bestow upon us in Your eternal grace. I am thankful, All-Mother, for Your unending kindness.”

Rost settled next to the rabbits he had put next to Grata, skinned and cleaned, and looked out over the valley as he tried to figure out what to say, how to ask for what he wanted without breaking tribal law.

Finally, he sighed.

“I thank You for the gift of life, All-Mother,” he murmured. “I thank You for the life You have given me, for the honor of nurturing that life into adulthood. I thank You for the youth and fertility of the life all around us, for the continuation of that life in Your endless cycle.”

Grata might - _might_ \- have choked a bit with laughter. “Truly You teach us well, great Goddess,” she finally said. If her voice shook a little with humor, they both ignored it. “We are thankful for Your teachings of the hunt, of stitching, of the healing potions. We thank You for the blue cohosh that, when one tablespoon is mixed with four cups boiling water, when it is steeped for five minutes, and drank when warm and until a woman’s bleeding comes and then again when her blood stops, delays life until such a time as she is ready to become a mother. We thank You for the patience and strength needed to speak of difficult subjects, and we turn to You in our bittersweet grief over the lives we care for separating from us to go out on their own.”

He sighed with relief and raised his hands towards All-Mother and the Metal Devil. “I thank You for Your eternal wisdom and mercy, All-Mother.”

Then he stood and left, Grata’s quiet laughter echoing behind him.

***

“... Rost?”

He had been staring at the fire for several minutes, wondering how he could have tracked the group of murderers beyond the known world, fought and bled and nearly died, seen machines and peoples that no one else before had seen, but _this_ was the hardest thing he had yet done in his life.

“Rost?”

He let out his breath sharply, making Aloy jump a bit. She wasn’t going to like this discussion, but it needed to be had. He didn’t think she was foolish enough to seek out a mate from the tribe while still an outcast, felt sure that she would be ignored even if she tried, but her interest was plainly there, and he was not going to chance being wrong on either point.

“You will become part of the tribe in a few short years,” he finally murmured.

“Uh … yeah. Is that what this is about? Because I was thinking, I can come see ---”

“Once you are a brave,” he continued, “you will likely take a mate, as well. Possibly choose to bear children.”

_“... What.”_

Her shock would have been hilarious, if not for the fact that it was _her_ he was telling this to, and _him_ telling it.

“Normally the mother would tell her daughter this, but …” He snorted as a distressed whine forced its way out of the girl’s throat.

“Rost, I really don’t ---”

“Aloy, you must listen to me.”

“No, really, please ---”

_“Aloy.”_ She shut her mouth with another whine. He kept staring at the fire. “There is a tea that women take daily, to prevent pregnancy until they are ready to conceive and have received the blessings of the Matriarchs. It is easy to brew, and should only be skipped when you bleed.”

“Please stop talking.”

His face was burning, but then, so was hers.

“All women take it.”

“I don’t need this talk.”

“Your interest in others your age is clear,” he told her shortly. She snapped her jaw shut and, when he glanced at her, was staring at him with wide, guilty eyes. “There is no shame in feeling desire for someone, Aloy, nor for exploring with them or yourself. I believe I have given you ample time for the latter.”

“... Yep, should have realized that sooner.”

That made him snort with a slight smile. “So long as everyone has consented, you are free to lay with whomever you please. But …” He huffed, staring hard at the fire as he tried to merge himself with it through sheer willpower alone. “When - if - you lay with a man, there is … he will be … it will be different than with yourself or a woman,” he finally forced out.

“Ok, then!” Aloy chirped, shoving herself up. “Great talk! Let’s, uh, never talk about this again, alright?”

_“Aloy.”_ She stomped her feet and whined again, arms crossed tightly over her chest, but while she didn’t sit back down, neither did she keep trying to run away. He closed his eyes and prayed for strength. “Do not think I find this any more comfortable than you do. You are … aware … of the differences between males and females.” Of course she did. They had bathed together until she had been old enough to both bathe herself and be embarrassed by bathing with him. She made a garbled noise. “Aloy, if you are not … suitably prepared, then laying with a man - for the first time or _any_ time - will hurt. You must ensure both that your mates look to your pleasure and comfort before …” He made vague gestures with his hands and then cleared his throat sharply. “... and that you are careful about who you allow into your bed.” She was whispering pleas for him to stop, but it was done under her breath, so he didn’t shush her. “You must not let your desire for _any_ type of affection cloud your judgement.”

“Right. Yeah. Got it. Please tell me we’re done.”

He sighed, told her which herbs to find and how to brew them, then waved her out the door. He didn’t think either of them had ever been as glad to be away from the other as they were at that moment.

It was a week before they could so much look at each other, and another before they could talk again.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my best hzd fic ever
> 
> also, blue cohosh is an actual contraceptive herb & the instructions here are really for how to make it but please don't actually use it without your has-an-actual-m.d.-from-an-accredited-university-doctor's approval


End file.
